faith gestures, one at a time over vast distances of space.” The TOTE leader seemed to relish the ingenuity of her plan. Her confidence impressed Fred, and he tried to see the logic of her reasoning, but it didn’t add up.
“You picked the wrong class of hostage,” he said at last.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Think about it. The colonists aboard the Chernobyl have already chosen to leave Earth forever. As far as public opinion is concerned, they’re already dead and gone. In addition, they’re made up of economic refugees, ex-chartists, small business owners, schoolteachers, and poets. In a word — ordinary nobodies. Do you honestly think the UD Space Command will think twice about them when they blow the hatches to board you?”
“Absolutely,” Veronica’s proxy said, as confident as ever. “We’re talking about a quarter million men and women. The world would never allow so many people to be snuffed out at once.”
Fred could only shake his head in disbelief. “Where have you been for the last hundred years? The UD would rather torpedo you to bits than let you get away with that ship. And then they’ll blame you and make it look like it was your fault. What were you thinking?” A tiny but all-important hint of doubt crept into Veronica’s expression, and Fred drove his point home. “I’m sorry to rain on your parade, but, honestly, don’t you people hire consultants?”
Fred prepared to leave. He doubted his words would have any effect on this pirate charter’s grand scheme. Before exiting the stockroom, he turned to the proxy, which didn’t seem nearly so cocksure as a few moments ago, and said, “Now, if you had chosen the Hybris instead, then you’d have real hostages. Each one of those feckers is either an aff or the clone of an aff. There aren’t nearly as many of them, but they make up for that in juice. They’re all VIPs, every last one of them. They are the very flesh of presidents, diplomats, and vid stars, parliamentarians — you name it. Now those are some hostages. No one’s going to torpedo that ship of fools. Not only that, but half its stasis crypts are empty.
“Anyway, thanks for the chat, but if all I have left is six months, I better get to it. See you back on Earth.”
FRED’S BRAVADO CARRIED him all the way back to his stateroom, where he finished packing. It took him to the Admin Wheel, where he turned in his standstill wand, visor cap, and TECA sidekick. It took him out the spar to the space gate where the Fentan was docked. It took him all the way to the gangway, but there it abandoned him. If he had managed to sow a seed of doubt in Veronica’s mind about her crazy scheme, she had managed to sow one in his about dropping everything and running to Mary’s side.
Veronica was probably right; by the time the Fentan reached Earth, the whole evangeline crisis would be resolved, one way or another. And, besides, what could he do that the world’s leading researchers couldn’t? This was bad enough, but the real question was whether or not Mary would welcome him. Even without the ’Leen Disease, would she want him to come barging in to rescue her? Again? Fred couldn’t get out of his head the little scene they had in their bedroom the morning of the clinic incident. She not only asked him not to interfere, she begged him not to. She sincerely wanted to handle the situation by herself.
But he had interfered anyway, and he had, in fact and in deed, saved her life, and thus Ellen Starke’s life. She had admitted as much. And by his actions he had landed in prison and then, to repay the TUGs for their logistical support, he had been forced to come up here. But — and here was the rub — had Mary ever thanked him? He scoured his memory for any word of thanks, any hint of appreciation, and he came up dry.
Fred hung in a corner of the gangway like a gargoyle, oblivious to the curious glances of passersby. If he went, he was screwed. If he stayed, he was screwed. After an hour or so of second-guessing, Marcus called.
“What do you want?”
To give you a word of advice.
“I don’t want your advice.”
I understand, but you are loitering in a very public space and causing a lot of talk.
“What do I care?”
I am asking you to care. You have made arrangements to leave the station and return to Earth. It is my opinion that you proceed to and board the Fentan.
“Why?”
Because your continued presence here at Trailing Earth is a constant irritant that will likely spark violent unrest.
“How so?”
Your brothers were already under a lot of strain before your arrival, due to the labor troubles with Capias World. The situation with the evangelines has pushed them to the breaking point. You are a convenient scapegoat, and I know that there have already been threats against your person. Now that the donalds have learned of your method results, it’s only a matter of time before they reveal them to the russ population. The falseness of the method will not restrain your brothers. They will express outrage, and our tenuous truce with the donalds will break down. There will be intergermline violence. Worse, there will be fratricide — your brothers will kill you. Your impulse to leave is a good one.
“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe I deserve what I get? You’ve said as much yourself.”
On the contrary, I haven’t yet given up on you. But the bigger issue is the good reputation of your germline. With your history of retrievable manslaughter, your death here at the hands of your brothers would surely seal the fate of your entire ten-million-strong issue.
“Really? Is fratricide any worse than our brutish Original Flaw?”
I’ve told you before, and I repeat, the whole Original Flaw method you underwent was a hoax. I assure you that the russ germline has never had a problem with pedophilia. That was pure fabrication.
“Is that a fact? And what about our fascination with evangelines and their boyish features and body type?”
What of it? You are equally attracted to the more voluptuous lulu type.
“What about my fascination with retrogirls? Even Mary noticed the attention I gave that Kodiak girl last year.”
Human males have always sought sexual congress with children, all the way back to Paleolithic times when female menarche occurred between the ages of seven and thirteen years. For dominant males to impregnate the youngest fertile females in a tribe was adaptively advantageous to the tribe. While this may no longer be so, the male’s attraction for children has survived into modern times, like the once-advantageous taste for sweets and fats. Biological propensities are hardwired into the genes and may take tens of millennia to weed out when they are no longer useful.
What’s important to keep in mind is that new, inhibitory tendencies emerge to counteract obsolete ones. While your sexual interest in children may be natural, your inhibition against acting on this interest is also natural and even stronger. Neither you nor Thomas A. nor any russ has ever violated society’s taboos in this regard. Whoever designed the Original Flaw method cleverly used your own russ sense of propriety against you to damage both you and your germline. I am attempting to mitigate the damage, but I will need your cooperation to do so.
How Fred wanted to believe the mentar, but he remembered the last time it had tried to talk him down from a ledge. It had tried to convince him that his Book of Russ debacle was due to HALVENE poisoning, and that hadn’t worked out either.
“Fine. You’ve said your piece, Marcus. I’m not a monster; now prove it. I ask again; if this isn’t the russ Original Flaw, then what is? You said you’d get the Brotherhood Council’s permission to tell me.”
I said I’d try to get it. Permission was denied.
“There you have it then,” Fred said as he pushed off from his perch. “Get back to me when you have a better answer.” He left the Fentan gang-way and returned to his stateroom to give the whole matter some serious obsessing.
